April got off to a great start at the specialty box office, with three films scoring debut averages of over $29,000 per-theater and another holding on to a $20,000+ average in its second frame.

Danny Boyle's "Trance," Shane Carruth's "Upstream Color" and Robert Redford's "The Company You Keep" made up the noted trio, with "Trance" taking the lead via a $34,026 average from 4 screens. The film -- released by Fox Searchlight -- grossed $136,103.

"We are happy with the strong performance…particularly on Saturday night where the film went up 63% over Fridays nights’ results," Fox Searchlight SVP Frank Rodriguez said. "We look forward to next week when we release the film nationally and will add approximately 375 to 400 theatres."

That expansion will certainly be a much bigger test of the appeal of "Trance," which stars James McAvoy and Rosario Dawson. The film grossed $2,394,559 from 408 screens in the UK when it debuted there last weekend.

Just as impressive as "Trance" was "Upstream Color," Shane Carruth's long-awaited follow up to "Primer." Carruth self-released the film through his erbp film, starting things off with an exclusive run at New York's IFC Center. The result was a stellar $31,500 gross, with multiple sold out shows. It also registered over $13,000 in pre-sales before opening, the highest pre-opening box office for any film opening on just one screen
at the IFC Center (and 2nd for all films, trailing only "Sleepwalk with
Me," which opened on multiple screens at the theater).

The film will open select top markets next weekend, including Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Seattle, Boston and Toronto, before adding another 15 markets on April 19 and expanding to the top 50 and more throughout late April and early May. It will be available to audiences across the country on all digital platforms and home video on May 7.

Also performing very nicely was Sony Pictures Classics release of Robert Redford's "The Company You Keep." Starring Shia LaBeouf, Susan Sarandon, Anna Kendrick and Redford himself, the film grossed a strong $146,058 from 5 theaters, averaging $29,212.

For "Company," "Color," and "Trance" to each average over $29,000 in the same weekend is an impressive feat and bodes well for a healthy April box office in the specialty market. In an ideal scenario they'll all hold up as well as Derek Cianfrance's "The Place Beyond The Pines" next weekend. That film went from 4 to 30 theaters in this its second weekend and grossed $695,041, averaging a very impressive $23,168. It also crossed the $1 million mark, with much more likely to be where that came from.

Check out a full list of reporting grosses for both debuts and holdovers below.